War With Iran Might Be Closer Than You Think

Former CIA officer and Antiwar.com columnist Philip Giraldi has a new scoop at the American Conservative blog.

There is considerable speculation and buzz in Washington today suggesting that the National Security Council has agreed in principle to proceed with plans to attack an Iranian al-Qods-run camp that is believed to be training Iraqi militants. The camp that will be targeted is one of several located near Tehran. Secretary of Defense Robert Gates was the only senior official urging delay in taking any offensive action. …

165 thoughts on “War With Iran Might Be Closer Than You Think”

Words fail me. Afghanistan was (and is) a debacle. Did Bush and his band of warmongers learn anything? Nope. On to Iraq! Five years, thousands dead, and a trillion dollars later, it makes Afghanistan look like a well run operation by comparison. Did they learn this time? Hell no. So off to Tehran we go!

My advice: buy gold, store some food and water, and get your bike in working order. When Bush gets done “protecting” us, you’ll need to take out a loan to fill up your gas tank, and that assumes he doesn’t get us all killed first.

Yah, I would definately suggest people start preparing. A good start is a stock of the essentials, food, water, and fuel. although a dog is good for protection it’s no match for a gun. I will stay armed and keep my dogs both for protection and hunting. Living in a remote area of Northen Michigan may not seem ideal to many, but it lets me have a degree of comfort. I already grow much of my own food, I hunt, fish and gather for even more. It’s sad to say but I sure wouldn’t want to be stuck in the city when the s**t hits the fan.

BANGKOK, Thailand May 9, 2008 (AP) — Oil prices hit a new record high above $125 Friday as a weaker U.S. dollar drove investments into commodities.

U.S. crude for June delivery rose as high as $126.20 a barrel in electronic trading on the New York Mercantile Exchange early Friday morning. On Thursday, the contract rose to a record settle of $123.69 a barrel. ….

A trillion? A trillion? Surely you josh. $3-7 trillion minimum and that’s just direct. Meanwhile the meter is running, and that means, say 15 to 20 trillion over perhaps fifteen years. If there are fifteen years and US papermaking is up to the challenge….

The problem here is people don’t understand, or perhaps choose not to understand, that we are ALREADY at war. We are already at war with radical Islam. And who is we? We is not only the United States but France, England, Australia and all the rest of Western Civilization. Radical Islam is at war with us and it does not matter whether radical Islam is represented in a particular battle by the Sunni radicals of Al-Quida or the Shia maniacs in Hizzbollah. Hamas, Hizzbollah, Al Quida and all the rest are just different parts of the same whole. They are all radical Muslims.

Western Civilization is basically too stupid and politically correct to admit that our civilization is superior, that is right, I said superior to the Muslims. So we play this game and continue with this joke called “multi-culturalism” where we pretend that the Muslims are all peaceful and loving and that their civilization with their barbaric, sexist, and homophobic ways, is not inferior to ours.

That’s fine. Let the Muslims get nuclear weapons. They are all loving and peaceful people. Just read the Quran and the Hadith and you will see how loving they are and I am sure they would never use nuclear weapons to kill.

So, what gives you the right to channel a Munich Speech, exactly? I consider about 30% of the USA to be composed of subhumans of the barbaric, sexist, homophobic and generally fascist persuasion (not to mention totally obnubilated by some religious bollocks of the worst sort). I can live with that.

This has zero to do with nukes. This is about selling the another PNAC war to the ignorant masses, a sort of supersized Operation Ajax part II.
I can’t believe people cannot see this, and learned nothing from the latest Iraq lie-marathon.

And why is that? Did I ever say we should nuke the Muslims? Did I ever say we should kill them all? I never said such a thing. On the contrary, I think we, as a civilized people, must do everything in our power to make sure innocent Muslims don’t get killed. But at the same time we have to recognize the fact that radical Islam is at war with western civilization. And we should operate on the thesis that our civilization is far superior to the Muslims and we have a right to defend it from their aggression.

If the Muslim barbarians want to live with a 7th century mentality, they can go right ahead. But just leave the rest of the civilized world alone!

Perhaps you never enunciated a platform of genocide, but it is not here that the similarities are found. Rather, your binary approach to politics, your classification of Muslim “civilization” as “inferior”, your attempts to ascribe Islamic violence to intrinsic proclivity rather than circumstance, your belief that this is a timeless quality, and your hostility toward anyone professing a belief in accommodation or cultural pluralism exactly mirror Nazi rhetoric and have, as their logical conclusion, a program of violence, racism, collectivism, and mass murder- if a whole people can be regarded as disciples of a depraved moral code, they are deprived of their moral weight, and genocide can be handily excused as an unfortunate necessity.

Ballocks! Latin (“western”) civilization, Byzantine (Russia and neighbors)civilization, Middle Eastern (“Islamic”) are Siamese triplets, not only pretty much alike, but unable to seperate each other. Learn to make friends with your neighbors, and your life will be better. Keep on picking fights, and in the end, you will destroy yourself.

But no! You say we’re already at war with Iran. OK, OK, so we can’t say we’re against “going to war against Iran”, because you personally own the meaning of the word “war”.

Well, let’s say we’re against “undertaking a bombing and/or invasion of Iran”, and there’s just no handy way to say that â€” since Tim R. has claimed the English language for himself, bulldozed it, built a settlement on it, and run it through some Hebrew processor so that everything comes out bass ackwards….

“They are all loving and peaceful people. Just read the Quran and the Hadith and you will see how loving they are”

Tim, I have read them both, and what I read was a lot of loving and caring and advice how to live safely and happily. I guess it all depends on how you view the world, and then how you interpret what you read to fit your world view. From your words I think we are quite aware of your world view, and to me it’s not that different from the so-called terrorists you Muslims you preach against.

Could you imagine this speech from a “terrorist” leader:

“The problem here is people donâ€™t understand, or perhaps choose not to understand, that we are ALREADY at war. We are already at war with the West. And who is we? We is not only Afghanistan but Iraq, Saudi Arabia, Syria and all the rest of Islamic Civilization. The Imperialistic West is at war with us and it does not matter whether it is represented in a particular battle by NATO soldiers in Afghanistan or US maniacs in Iraq. America, Britain, Israel and all the rest are just different parts of the same whole. They are all greedy Westerners.

Muslims are basically too stupid admit that our civilization is superior, that is right, I said superior to the West. So we play this game and continue with this joke called â€œpeace processâ€ where we pretend that the West is peaceful and loving and that their civilization with their barbaric, sexist, and homophobic ways, is not inferior to ours.

Thatâ€™s fine. Let the West use nuclear weapons. They are all loving and peaceful people. Just read the crap coming from the line-up of potential US presidents and you will see how loving they are and I am sure they would never use nuclear weapons to kill.”

It is extraordinary that after the obvious falsities utilized as an excuse for the invasion of Iraq the myth of WMD is once again fooling the apparently painfully naive into believing a similar situation exists with Iran.

“I guess it all depends on how you view the world, and then how you interpret what you read to fit your world view.”

It depends not only on interpretation but also on which snippets you happen to cherry-pick, and on which sects or cults you happen to focus. All three Abrahamic religions have a myriad of different sects and the Koran, hadith, Bible, Christian theological works, and the Talmud and its derivative works all have passages that are bloodthirsty. Of course, those who call for violence in all three traditions tend to point to the bloodthirsty passages of their own religious texts as justification. There are millions of Christian Dispensationalist in the US who support Israel regardless of how brutal the Israelis become, because they believe it will hasten the coming of the Rapture and Armaggedon. That doesn’t mean that most Christians aren’t loving and peaceful, unlike Tim R.

Tim also needs to keep in mind that the West has been lording it over the Muslim world for hundreds of years, especially since WW I. We’ve been stealing their oil ever since Churchill converted the British fleet to oil 100 years ago. For most of that time there was no Muslim terrorism in Europe or the US. We supported the bloody Shah for 26 years. We meddled in Iraq, destabilizing the post-Faisal regime there and encouraging the coup that brought the Ba’ath and Saddam Hussein to power. We instigated the Iran-Iraq War and armed both sides in pursuit of “dual containment”. We invaded Lebanon several times, propping up the Phallangists. We took sides in their civil war, shelling Shia neighborhoods in Beirut. The CIA attempted to assassinate a Lebanese Ayatollah with a car bomb, missing him but killing scores of women and children. None of these attacks and aggressions were in any way justified any more than 9-11 was, but they all occurred before 9-11, and they were the motivation for that bloody crime. They hate us not because we’re Christian or Jewish or “Western” but because of what we’ve been doing. And we just keep right on doing it. They’re not over here; we’re over there.

You raise some valid points that I will concede. The United States and the West has meddled in the Middle East, often times in ways that were injurious to the Arab Muslims over there. Some of the things we did, like helping to arm Saddam with chemical weapons that he used to kill thousands of innocent people were shameful and inexcusable. I never said the west was perfect (just superior to Muslim civilization by comparison) You are correct that the Muslims have some legitimate grievances with us. But my point is that if it were not for Islamic radicalism and religious zealots, they would find better ways of dealing with their grievances. The Dali Lama has some very legitimate grievances against the Chinese Communist Party but I don’t see him calling on his people to hijack airplanes and ram them into skyscrapers in Beijing.

One last point though: You said that we have been “stealing their oil” for a hundred years. So why is it that we spend so much money on oil? Over a 120 a barrel and I have to pay almost 4 dollars at the pump? Meanwhile and Iranian can fill up at the pump for not even half that. And the in-bred Saudi princes get to build 500 room mega mansions with our oil money? If we were stealing it we would just be taking it. Seems to me like OPEC is making plenty of money off us. So I don’t see how we are stealing it.

I might ask what you mean by “Islamic civilization”, and to operationalize the concept of “inferior”. For distinct social structures and the tangible facts of socioeconomic life you substitute the nebulous notion of “civilization” as an analytically bereft epithet. As a sociological unit, “Islamic civilization” does not exist- it is a discursive invention. Islamic states has a long history of intellectual and financial fecundity; their current pitiful status is rather recent development. While we’re at it, I’d query what you mean by “the West” and “Islamic civilization” and how they differ in their proficiencies (as “superior” premises a fixed teleology), as well as how the west is “superior” to “Islamic civilization”, as opposed to the current cluster of Islamic states. For once, let’s see something besides broad generalities and spurious correlations.

I am a Muslim. Do you know any Muslims? Have you actually ever read the Qu’ran or hadith or do you rely on the distortions of racist hate sites? Who are you to say Muslims are not peaceful people when you are the one obviously lusting for war from the PC in your mother’s basement? What justification do you have to say that “Western” (whatever that is) civilization is superior to Islamic civilization? Based on what? Drug use? Unwed pregnancies? Violent crime? What? What criteria are you using to base this? Your imagined freedoms?

If you could turn off Fox News for a second and actually LISTEN to what the Iranians have said, they consider it an abomination to use nuclear weapons. This is a sound religious opinion. I know you’re not familiar with a government that may actually be telling the truth or is composed of religious members who actually believe in and practice their religion instead of posing to get the rubes to vote them into office so they can slowly bleed them to death, but you are the one who is hostile and warmongering. I want peace.

How would you feel if a foreign entity invaded and occupied, for example, Canada, and routinely stationed war ships 50 miles off the coast of New York? What would you do? The nuclear issue is a dead one. Iran is operating perfectly within the confines of international law and in accordance with the Non-Proliferation Treaty. You know, the one your darling friend Israel REFUSES to sign? The one your great ally REFUSES to sign and you reward with nuclear incentives?

You can demonize a culture with your mythology and stay ensconsed in your happy fantasy land, but basically it makes you sound like an idiot.

What you read are transelations by persons who mistranselate in order to advance their agenda and yours.But how much peace the west has showered the rset of the world since 1900.You will feel so strongly on the subject as long as there are people who refuse to be ruled by Israel.

I, myself, have tried to read the Koran. It is very difficult for me. But, from what I have slogged through, the Koran emphasizes that God (Allah) is just, kind and all-merciful. The Koran, rather than dehumanizing women, seems to me to go to great lengths to spell out women's rights in marriage, divorce and inheritance. The Koran does speak harshly about infidels (hostile atheists) but it also, to me, clear that Christians are not infidels but are referred to as followers of the scriptures. Jews do not come off as well as the Christians in the Koran, which makes one wonder why anyone thought that establishing a Jewish enclave right in the center of Islam was such a good idea.

But Tim R, comparing the Torah (first 5 chapters of the Old Testament) against the Koran for violence is no contest. The Old Testament G-d is a "jealous god", a vengeful god that exists only to scourge Israel's rivals. It is not universal or tolerant; it is racist (a god that recognizes only the sanctity of Jewish life). A god needing endless slaughter of humans and animals. Leviticus and Deuteronomy are weird beyond anything in the Koran. In Leviticus, it actually lays out the scenario that if two mens are fighting and the wife of one contestant grabs the testicles of her husband's adversary, she should be killed. (Seems like that guideline never comes up in sermons). And when it comes to really pornographic stuff, one can't beat Ezekiel full of comparisons of Israel as a whore or a she-ass lusting after the large penises of the Chaldeans.

Maybe, Tim R you are a non-observing Jew. If you are, I can't blame you. I believe like Thomas Jefferson, that the Old Testament is fiction and pretty coarse fiction, at that. If you are non-observant, please lay off the Islamic religion. If you are devoutly Jewish, how could you not know these things.

Tim R,
I bet that what you’ve read of the Koran, is the excerpts that a Mr. Robert Spencer, picked out for his little books. You, yourself, pointed this out in a posting urging all to read Mr. Spencer. Robert Spencer writes about Islam in the style of Ann Coulter writing about liberals. I believe one of his little gems is something called “The Politically Incorrect guide to Islam” and another is dedicated to calling Mohammed a “throat slitting camel thief” or something equally uplifting. Spencer calls himself a Bibical scholar but I understand that he has not had a word published by any respectful journal. If what you know of Islam comes from what you have learned at Spencer’s knee, then it explains a lot about your ridiculous caricatures of Islam. As the saying goes “garbage-in, garbage-out”.

Yes, I have certainly read Spencer’s works. But as someone trained in law I know the importance of going to the source text itself. Someone else’s version of the Quran is not as reliable as the source itself. So I would never take Spencer’s word on anyone elses word as to what the Quran says. I have always double checked chapter and verse in various differen translations of the Quran so as to make sure that it is, indeed, as violent as Spencer says it is.

In the last century alone how many wars were started by your so called ‘superior civilization’,and how many millions of humane lives destroyed by such a civilization?When it comes to barbarism none surpass your Western Civilization!The muslim world has been at the recieving end of such westren barbrism for over 2 centries non-stop.For your information,the west has never and will never consider Judaism part of western civilization ,wish as much as you may or like to pretend.

What you are doing here is to make Israel enemies the west enemies,and have the west fight them on your behalf!

When the Europeans came in contact with other non-european people whose lands and resources the Europeans coveted,the Europeans subjecated ,opperessed ,and in many instants destroyed such people by claiming of being superior to those people that ”that our civilization is superior”.Since these people so inferior in every aspect whatever is done to them was all accepetable!Nothing much changed!

“We is not only the United States but France, England, Australia and all the rest of Western Civilization. “.

Would France be included in the list years back when it was part of the “old Europe” and refused to be part of the coalition of the willings!?But why is Israel not included in it?!!Why Germany is not there either?

Gee, Tim, tired of life, Western Civilization really demonstrated its superiority by attempting suicide in 1914. The suicidal creature made another failed attempt using Fascism, Communism, Zionism, National Socialism and the New Deal as its instruments of self destruction resulting in a massive vein slashing in 1939.

Still tired of living, superior Western Civilization has gone on to concoct a toxic brew of nuclear weapons in a military industrial complex goblet which it is now threatening to force on the rest of the world in order to save us all from the horrors of Islam.

First of all, the plan has always been to take over (or reshape) the entire Middle East. This is obvious from the writtings from the project for a New American Century, the neo-conservitive think tank. http://www.newamericancentury.org

Whether you believe their motive is oil, Isreal, the fight against radical Islam, greed, religious proficy or about a dozen other posible reasons, it should be clear that this would be a huge mistake. The deaths of millions of people will be the result. It will not make us safer unless of course we think we can wipe out the 1.3 billion Muslims that are currently on earth, without a backlash from the other nations of the world.

I believe in a strong Unitied States of America, however this is not the way to make us strong, just more vulnerable. We should bring our troops home, man the borders, stop the support and medling we are doing for any and all of the countries in the world. It’s time we worry about us and not them. If you wish to call me an isolationist thats fine (although I do support free and not managed trade).

We cannot afford the cost of these wars, including the costs of life, money, moral standing, etc. War does not create, it only destroys. We should take what resourses we have left and rebuild our country. If we are attacked by all means we should be willing and able to defend ourselves. However, we should never be involved in preemptive wars of choice.

Clean Break, what a joke! Pretty Orwellian wouldn’t you say? Peace through endless war, great stuff. Organized by the amazing Richard Perle, with help from James Colbert, Charles Fairbanks, Jr., Douglas Feith, Robert Loewenberg, David Wurmser, and Meyrav Wurmser.
Sad to say but they are already about halfway there.

Isn’t it amazing when a plan comes together? kind of reminds me of mein kampf. It’s all been written out for anyone to read. But who has time for reading when your so dumbed down you can’t comprehend? What will it take to wake people up to the ugly reality? The hardest part is being one of the few who sees and feeling the hopelessness that comes without the ability to affect change. But you never know, it’s kind of like the pebble thrown in a pool, one ripple goes on and on. Keep up the good work and mabey your stone will reach the other side.

In games with multiple betting rounds, to bluff on one round with an inferior or drawing hand that might improve in a later round is called a semi-bluff. A player making a semi-bluff can win the pot two different ways: by all opponents folding immediately or by catching a card to improve the player’s hand. In some cases a player may be on a draw but with odds strong enough that he is favored to win the hand. In this case his bet is not classified as a semi-bluff even though his bet may force opponents to fold hands with better current strength.

For example, a player in a stud poker game with four spade-suited cards showing (but none among their downcards) on the penultimate round might raise, hoping that his opponents believe he already has a flush. If his bluff fails and he is called, he still might be dealt a spade on the final card and win the showdown (or he might be dealt another non-spade and try his bluff again, in which case it is a pure bluff on the final round rather than a semi-bluff).

[wikipedia]

Giraldi is being used, conscisously or unconsciously.

I have not seen the Game Theory that applies to the case of trying to persuade an outside observer indirectly to communicate a bluff (pure, semi-, etc.) as not a bluff to other players in the game and as part of the game.

Whoever is feeding Giraldi this info is likely using him for their own means no doubt. However, it’s also possible that the intention is to leave us with the belief that the attack will be small. Don’t you think it’s possible that it’s not a bluff but disinformation made to cover for a much larger attack? Remember that many games of chance are played with the rule of winner takes all. So far it seems as if these are the games the neo-cons like the best. The board is already set and we have made the first move (never a good idea).

Do you see what’s happening here? Not only has your opponent wised up to your pattern of always bluffing each time you had a busted drawing hand, but more importantly, your results are not a function of your actions. Instead, the results you achieve are wholly dependent on the choices your opponent made. You are no longer in charge, and that’s a bad thing. Your playing strategy has allowed the locus of control to pass to your opponent, who, by virtue of his decisions about whether to call or fold, is the one who determines how much you win or lose….”

Yes, and it appears Hezbollah is now in control of Lebanon, having called the half-bluff attempt to cripple their communication network. It remains to be seen what will happen in the next round, but I have a sneaking suspicion that any card our Proxy Siniora plays will be a loser. It appears perhaps the Lebanese people are not willing to fight the only force capable of withstanding Israeli aggression. The civil war we are attempting to instigate would clearly open Lebanon up to invasion. Let us hope there are enough Lebanese who remember earlier times that such a disaster can be avoided. Let us hope Hezbollah acts with sufficient restraint and humility. Wouldn’t it be ironic if this results in a new Constitution that does away with the confessional system and allows coallescense of a real Lebanese national identity and the strengthening of the polity against US and Israeli aggression?

Towards the middle of the third century after Christ a school of law and jurisprudence arose at Berytus, which attained high distinction, and is said by Gibbon to have furnished the eastern provinces of the empire with pleaders and magistrates for the space of three centuries (A.D. 250-550). The course of education at Berytus lasted five years, and included Roman Law in all its various forms, the works of Papinian being especially studied in the earlier times, and the same together with the edicts of Justinian in the later. Pleaders were forced to study either at Berytus, or at Rome, or at Constantinople, and, the honours and emoluments of the profession being large, the supply of students was abundant and perpetual. External misfortune, and not internal decay, at last destroyed the school, the town of Berytus being completely demolished by an earthquake in the year A.D. 551. The school was then transferred to Sidon, but appears to have languished on its transplantation to a new soil and never to have recovered its pristine vigour or vitality.

In many respects, one of the most important cities of Phoenicia during the time of the Roman Empire was Berytus. It became the seat of the most famous provincial school of Roman law. The school, which probably was founded by Septimius Severus, lasted until the destruction of Berytus itself by a sequence of earthquakes, tidal wave, and fire in the mid-6th century. Two of Rome’s most famous jurists, Papinian and Ulpian, both natives of Phoenicia, taught as professors at the law school under the Severans. Their judicial opinions constitute well over a third of the Pandects (Digest) contained in the great compilation of Roman law commissioned by the emperor Justinian I in the 6th century AD.

Two great enterprises had substantially despatched Justinianâ€™s work; however, he, or rather Tribonian, who seems to have acted both as his adviser and as his chief executive officer in all legal affairs, conceived that a third book was needed, viz. An elementary manual for beginners which should present an outline of the law in a clear and simple form. The little work of Gaius, most of which we now possess under the title of Commentarii institutionum, had served this purpose for nearly four centuries; but much of it had, owing to changes in the law, become inapplicable, so that a new manual seemed to be required. Justinian accordingly directed Tribonian, with two coadjutors, Theophilus, professor of law in the university of Constantinople, and Dorotheus, professor in the great law school at Berytus, to prepare an elementary textbook on the lines of Gaius. This they did while the Digest was in progress, and produced the useful little treatise which has ever since been the book with which students commonly begin their studies of Roman law, the Institutes of Justinian. It was published as a statute with full legal validity shortly before the Digest. Such merits as it possesses â€“ simplicity of arrangement, clearness and conciseness of expression â€“ belong less to Tribonian than to Gaius, who was closely followed wherever the alterations in the law had not made him obsolete. However, the spirit of that great legal classic seems to have in a measure dwelt with and inspired the inferior men who were recasting his work, the Institutes is better both in Latinity and in substance than we should have expected from condition of Latin letters at that epoch, better than the other laws which emanate from Justinian….</i

[phoenicia.org]

The “Israel” of the Zionists, “Israel”, is what–60 years old. What a joke.

Iranâ€™s Bushehr nuclear reactor has 82 tons of enriched uranium (U235) now loaded into it, according to Israeli and Chinese news reports. The plant is scheduled to become operational this summer, producing electricity. The Natanz enrichment facility is operating a full capacity, enriching uranium for use in reactors according to IAEA reports.

According to the Center for Disease Control, the uranium 235 used in nuclear reactors has a half life of 700 million years. As nuclear reactor fuel is used, it turns into uranium 238, which has a half life of 4.5 billion years. These radioactive isotopes are dangerous to health because they emit alpha particles and because they are chemically toxic. When inhaled, they damage lung tissue. When ingested, they damage kidneys and cause cancer in bones and in liver tissues. According to a recent review of medical research, uranium exposure causes babies to be deformed or born dead.

Never in history has it happened that nuclear power plants and nuclear enrichment facilities have been deliberately bombed. Such facilities, everywhere in the world, operate under severe safety conditions because the release of radioactive materials is deadly, immediately and also long after exposure. If the USA or Israel deliberately bomb a fully fueled nuclear power plant or nuclear fuel enrichment facilities, containment will be breached; radioactive elements will be released into the environment. There will be horrific deaths for families in the surrounding vicinity. The Union of Concerned Scientists has estimated 3 million deaths would result in 3 weeks from bombing the nuclear enrichment facilities near Esfahan, and the contamination would cover Afghanistan, Pakistan, all the way to India.

Much has been written about their organizational and political underpinnings (ranging from the role of multinational corporations to the history of free trade agreements), but much less on the history of the two prime movers that made these realities possible. Neither steam engines, nor gasoline-fuelled engines could have accomplished comparable feats. Diesel engines made ocean shipping the cheapest mode of long-distance transport and without gas turbines there would be no fast, inexpensive, mass-scale intercontinental travel….”

Rodney Lee Parsley (born January 13, 1957), an American televangelist, is senior pastor of World Harvest Church, a Pentecostal megachurch in Columbus, Ohio and founder and president of The Center for Moral Clarity. He is also founder of Breakthrough Media Ministries, Bridge of Hope Missions, World Harvest Bible College, Harvest Preparatory School, World Harvest Church Ministerial Fellowship, Metro Harvest Church, Latin Harvest Church, Reformation Ohio and The Women’s Clinic of Columbus. Parsley, a social conservative,[1] is a frequent critic of liberal positions on social issues, but has sided with more liberal organizations on issues of social justice, such as poverty, racism, women’s rights and prison re-entry. He has been a guest on CNN’s “Larry King Live” and other media shows….

Parsley holds a bachelor’s degree from Ohio Christian University and honorary doctoral degrees from Indiana Christian University and Liberty University….

Parsley supported John Roberts’ nomination for the Supreme Court of the United States.He has personally endorsed the presidential campaign of Republican nominee John McCain, who has called Parsley a “spiritual guide.” Parsley is also a regional director for the Christian Zionist group Christians United for Israel, founded by fellow televangelist John Hagee.

Parsley is an author of several books, including Silent No More..Parsley writes that government should “get out of the way”, removing many constraints on capitalism. Parsley criticizes Islam, stating that he “do[es] not believe that our country can truly fulfill its divine purpose until we understand America was founded, in part, with the intention of seeing this false religion destroyed….”

So what is your point about Parsley? He has a right to his opinions. And last time I checked Sen. McCain was not a member of his Church ( or Hagee’s) for 20 years. Nor did Parsley or Hagee baptize Sen. McCain’s children, nor did they perform Sen. McCain’s marriage, nor did Sen. McCain use their sermons for the title of his book, nor did they sit on McCain’s campaign as an official “spiritual advisor.” Can the same be said of Mr. Barack Hussein Obama ( the new Messiah of the left) and his spiritual mentor the very right rev. Jeremiah Wright? Oh that’s right I almost forget, Mr. Barry Barack Hussein Obama was there for 20 years but he was absent on any Sundays where his pastor talked about controversial stuff and he only heard about it now and of course he could no more disown Rev. Wright than he could “his own grandmother.” Oooops. I almost forgot when it became politically expedient he DID disown Rev. Wright. So does that mean he also does not talk to his own grandmother now? Oh yeah this guy is true blue. Barry Barack Hussein Obama. A real honest gentlemen!

Why these paltry diversions, Tim? Reverend Wright hasn’t called for the extermination of a whole religion, nor does he believe America’s nuclear arsenal is something to be used to expedite the Rapture. Your sad little excursus forms the pinnacle of polemical ineptitude as you feebly attempt to draw an unfavourable comparison of Obama to McCain where none exists. Why humiliate yourself so when your sentiments could be expressed far more eloquently by joining the IDF?

Please read some history in the mid 30’s.In in Germany,folks lost their jobs and food prices sky rocketed. America’s rising unemployment, food costs,fuel costs,loss of homes and lack of jobs (notice it just happened overnite) .Wake-up America your groomed to fight for WWIII,just like the Germans were.

I think that the pro-Israel lobby in this country is sadly tarnishing the reputation of all Jews. I can see the backlash in my own life. But, at this point, with Zionists (and I make the great differentiation between Zionists and other Christians and Jews) controlling the “news” media, Hollywood, the armed forces, the Pentagon, and the entire political process, plus their propaganda controlling what little there is of the American mind, what can enlightened Americans do to stop an attack on Iran, i.e. national suicide?

I mean seriously, my local ABC news beats the drum against Iran, in between covering car chases, who’s going to be on Oprah, and Hilton sightings. How the heck is Iran a threat to my community? Or Hamas, which has offered Israel many truces and has stated repeatedly that it would never attack the U.S. or U.S. assets?

And now Obama has thrown overboard an adviser for daring to do his non-campaign related job and talk with Hamas.

Even Howard Dean, in a debate w/ Richard Perle a few years back, said that Iraq was the “low-hanging fruit” and Iran was the real threat.

I call my (Democratic) congressional reps asking for details on why Iran is a threat to the U.S. and for my troubles have been put on the TSA watch list. Well, as far as I can tell I’m on it — I get special screening every single time despite never having been accused of a crime.

And seriously would a “terrorist” be calling their congress person from the same home phone number each time? They’d have to be as dumb as the ones who basically failed flight school but managed to make a fantastic turn in order to strike the part of the Pentagon where Rumsfeld wasn’t, allowing him to decide that day to attack Iraq.

Those terrorists, always managing to do exactly what the pro-Israel lobby/ military-industrial complex wants. And just at the right times too. Such serendipity…Remember the Maine! And the Lusitania! And Pearl Harbor! And Operation Northwoods! And the Gulf of Tonkin! And the Iranian boats in the PERSIAN Gulf — what chutzpah those Iranians have — sailing in their own waters!

The saddest part is that even those of us who know the score are going to have our lives destroyed by this coming attack. Maybe they’ll put us all in the same gulag when the inevitable round-ups begin…

Confiscatory deflation is a particular category of deflation. It is inflicted on the economy by the political authorities as a means of obstructing an ongoing bank credit deflation that threatens to liquidate an unsound financial system built on fractional reserve banking. Its essence is an abrogation of bank depositors’ property titles to their cash stored in immediately redeemable checking and savings deposits….

The USA already has two losing or lost wars on its hands in Iraq and Afghanistan and now they want to start a third one? Isn’t the definition of insanity to do the same thing over and over and expect a different outcome? You think Iran won’t mind if the USA bombs them? What happens on Bomb-day +1, +2 etc,, This is madness. The USA needs campaign finance reform to prevent private lobby groups like the vile AIPAC from kidnapping the foreign policy of the USA.

Merely by the way, one of the best and most detailed accounts one ever read about the connection between the way the Russians built their tanks during WWII and what the Japanese auto industry learned from them was in a short, but brilliantly done little booklet found in a Japanese model kit many many moons ago.

And in those magic moments to remember, who will evern forget the inimitable Harry (no “S”) Belafonte:

Old man Noah built an ark, Hallelujah
Worked from dawn ’til after dark, Hallelujah
When he left for foreign shores, Hallelujah
Had a big family but had no oars, Hallelujah
Michael row the boat ashore, Hallelujah!
Michael row the boat ashore, Hallelujah!….

The Iranians are not stupid, they have repeatedly embarassed the USA on the international stage and are clearly artfully treading a rather thin line. The hints at (or rather demands for by people like John Bolton (why does this guy get so much press?)) a “limited strike” against a “training camp” seem like an attempt to force the Iranian hand in the light of the USAs frustrated attempts to achieve political subjugation and intimidation of the iranian state.

Such a strike would force the Iranians to either retaliate in kind, a situation which obviously has the potential to rapidly escalate into full-scale warfare, or acquiesce in the manner that Syria did after the Israeli strike on their alleged “nuclear facility”.

In my laymans opinion, this idea of bombing an iranian military base is nothing more than an attempt to trigger a military response from Iran, which would be used as justification for launching a massive “retaliatory” attack against Iran.

While the world press has focused on Iran’s plans to move ahead with enriching uranium, Tehran continues to wage economic war against the U.S. dollar behind the scenes.

Tehran has reached a decision to end all oil sales in dollars, according to statements by Iran’s central bank governor, Ehrabhim Sheibany, in Kuala Lumpur at the end of last month.

Zhuhai Zhenrong Trading, a Chinese state-run company that buys 240,000 barrels of oil per day from Iran, approximately 10 percent of Iran’s 2.2 million barrels per day total output, has confirmed a shift to the euro for its Iranian oil purchases.

About 60 percent of Iran’s oil income is currently in non-dollar currencies, according to Hojjatollah Ghanimifard, who is responsible for international affairs for National Iranian Oil.

Even Japanese refiners who buy some 550,000 barrels of oil a day from Iran have indicated their willingness to buy Iran’s oil in yen.

China, which buys approximately 12 percent of its crude oil supply from Iran, signed last year a long-term $100 billion deal with Iran to develop Iran’s giant Yadvaran oil field. Estimates indicate China could draw 150,000 barrels of oil from the Yadvaran field for the next 25 years, assuring Iran’s position as one of the major suppliers of oil to China for decades to come.

One possibility is that China may begin paying Iran for oil in yuans.

Meanwhile, China which now holds $1 trillion in foreign reserve holdings, announced March 20 it will no longer accumulate foreign exchange reserves.

This is more bad news for the dollar, since approximately 70 percent of China’s $1 trillion in foreign reserve holdings are held in U.S. dollar assets.

[Global Research Arpil 2007]

TEHRAN, Iran: Iran, OPEC’s second-largest producer, has stopped conducting oil transactions in U.S. dollars, a top Oil Ministry official said Wednesday, a concerted attempt to reduce reliance on Washington at a time of tension over Tehran’s nuclear program and suspected involvement in Iraq.

Iran has dramatically reduced dependence on the dollar over the past year in the face of increasing U.S. pressure on its financial system and the fall in the value of the American currency.

Oil is priced in U.S. dollars on the world market, and the currency’s depreciation has concerned producers because it has contributed to rising crude prices and eroded the value of their dollar reserves.

“The dollar has totally been removed from Iran’s oil transactions,” Oil Ministry official Hojjatollah Ghanimifard told state-run television Wednesday. “We have agreed with all of our crude oil customers to do our transactions in non-dollar currencies.”

Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad called the depreciating dollar a “worthless piece of paper” at a rare summit last year in Saudi Arabia attended by state leaders from the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries.

AP November 18, 2007 â€œThey get our oil and give us a worthless piece of paper,â€ Ahmadinejad told reporters after the close of the summit in the Saudi capital of Riyadh. He blamed U.S. President George W. Bushâ€™s policies for the decline of the dollar and its negative effect on other countries.

Oil is priced in U.S. dollars on the world market, and the currencyâ€™s depreciation has concerned oil producers because it has contributed to rising crude prices and has eroded the value of their dollar reserves…

Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez echoed this sentiment Sunday on the sidelines of the summit, saying â€œthe empire of the dollar has to end.â€

â€œDonâ€™t you see how the dollar has been in free-fall without a parachute?â€ Chavez said, calling the euro a better option.

Generalizations are worthless unless based closely on facts, and carefully qualified.

With Putin, the type of man he is obviously in his career, as a prosopographer approaches it. Medvedev exhibits a similar pattern. If there are men of this type in the United States at all, they are certainly not in politics nor well known.

At best there may be one or two in the middle ranks of the military but I doubt it.

The social and economic context will squash them wherever they appear if they become prominent.

Nor will they ever be allowed by the present elite to work together in any area where there is what is publicly recognized as “power”.

“Technocrat” misses the target.

The Romans, at their best and most well-governed, early and late, had many of the type.

Former Federal Reserve Chairman Alan Greenspan said in September 2007 that the euro could replace the U.S. dollar as the world’s primary reserve currency. It is “absolutely conceivable that the euro will replace the dollar as reserve currency, or will be traded as an equally important reserve currency.” Econometrical analysis suggests, the euro may replace the U.S. dollar as the major reserve currency by 2020 if: (1) the remaining EU members, including the UK, adopt the Euro by 2020 or the recent depreciation trend of the dollar persists into the future.

[wikipedia s.v. Reserve Currnecy]

Boy are these hombres slow upstairs. The flaw:“Econometrical analysis suggests, the euro may replace the U.S. dollar as the major reserve currency by 2020 if: (1) the remaining EU members, including the UK, adopt the Euro by 2020 or the recent depreciation trend of the dollar persists into the future”

I am telling you folks, predicting the past is big business. But even that, done right, is much harder than it looks, and these incompetents are way over their head, present, past, or future.

“There is still, despite everything, a real world. Beneath the glitz and glitter, the crisis of American capitalism is assuming gigantic proportions. Of the 50 states in the Union, well over a majority are on the verge of bankruptcy. The essential systems of social welfare are breaking down. The school systems are a shambles. If literacy were to be defined as the ability to write a paragraph without a grammatical error, less than one quarter of Americans would qualify as literate. The health-care system is starved of funds and services are being cut back drastically. Entire industries face collapse. Within less than a year, much of the American airline industry will no longer exist. The massive diversion of resources to fund tax cuts for the wealthiest section of the population threatens national insolvency. The levels of social inequality exceed by far that of any other major capitalist country. A staggering percentage of the nationâ€™s wealth is in the hands of the wealthiest two percent of the population. A study by Kevin Phillips established that the annual income of the richest 14,000 families is greater than the annual income of the poorest 20,000,000 families.

It is impossible to avoid the conclusion that the extremely militaristic evolution of American foreign policy is, to a significant extent, an attempt by the ruling elite to deal with the dangers posed by the ever-increasing levels of social tension within the United States. Militarism serves two critical functions: first, conquest and plunder can provide, at least in the short term, additional resources that can ameliorate economic problems; second, war provides a means for directing internal social pressures outward.

But these short-term â€œbenefitsâ€ cannot cure the economic and social diseases that afflict America. Even if the United States achieves a swift military victory in Iraq, the social and economic crisis of America will continue to fester and intensify. None of its institutionsâ€”economic, social and politicalâ€”is equipped to respond in any positive manner to the general crisis of US society.

The war itself represents a devastating failure of American democracy. A small cabal of political conspiratorsâ€”working with a hidden agenda and having come to power on the basis of fraudâ€”has taken the American people into a war that they neither understand nor want. But there exists absolutely no established political mechanism through which the opposition to the policies of the Bush administrationâ€”to the war, the attack on democratic rights, the destruction of social services, the relentless assault on the living standards of the working classâ€”can find expression. The Democratic Partyâ€”the stinking corpse of bourgeois liberalismâ€”is deeply discredited. Masses of working people find themselves utterly disenfranchised.

The twentieth century was not lived in vain. Its triumphs and tragedies have bequeathed to the working class invaluable political lessons, among which the most important is the understanding of the significance and implications of imperialist war. It is, above all, the manifestation of national and international contradictions that can find no solution within â€œnormalâ€ channels. Whatever the outcome of the initial stages of the conflict that has begun, American imperialism has a rendezvous with disaster. It cannot conquer the world. It cannot reimpose colonial shackles upon the masses of the Middle East. It will not find through the medium of war a viable solution to its internal maladies. Rather, the unforeseen difficulties and mounting resistance engendered by war will intensify all of the internal contradictions of American society….

David North March 21 2003

March 21 2003? Boy,this guy’s pretty prescient, wouldn’t you say? That was five years ago. Mr. Paul, Mr. Jones? A dash of catsup on your Freedom Fries perhaps?

Anybody in the UP burning the American Flag in public yet, or it is a secret vice still?

….Take up the White Man’s burden–
No tawdry rule of kings,
But toil of serf and sweeper–
The tale of common things.
The ports ye shall not enter,
The roads ye shall not tread,
Go make them with your living,
And mark them with your dead.

Take up the White Man’s burden–
And reap his old reward:
The blame of those ye better,
The hate of those ye guard–
The cry of hosts ye humour
(Ah, slowly!) toward the light
“Why brought he us from bondage,
Our loved Egyptian night?”

Take up the White Man’s burden–
Ye dare not stoop to less–
Nor call too loud on Freedom
To cloak your weariness;
By all ye cry or whisper,
By all ye leave or do,
The silent, sullen peoples
Shall weigh your gods and you…

It is important to emphasize that this was written about the United States’s War in the Philippines:

The White Man’s Burden” is a poem by the English poet Rudyard Kipling. It was originally published in the popular magazine McClure’s in 1899, with the subtitle The United States and the Philippine Islands. “The White Man’s Burden” was written in regard to the U.S. conquest of the Philippines and other former Spanish colonies. Although Kipling’s poem mixed exhortation to empire with sober warnings of the costs involved, imperialists within the United States latched onto the phrase “white man’s burden” as a characterization for imperialism that justified the policy as a noble enterprise.

The poem was originally written for Queen Victoria’s Diamond Jubilee, but exchanged for “Recessional”; Kipling changed the text of “Burden” to reflect the subject of American colonization. The poem consists of seven stanzas, following a regular rhyme scheme. At face value it appears to be a rhetorical command to white men to colonize and rule people of other nations for their own benefit (both the people and the duty may be seen as representing the “burden” of the title). Because of its theme and title, it has become emblematic both of Eurocentric racism and of Western aspirations to dominate the developing world. A century after its publication, the poem still rouses strong emotions, and can be analyzed from a variety of perspectives….

[wikipedia s.v. White Man’s Burden]

This was the war in which Mark Twain suggested that the Stars and Stripes be redesigned in red and black, for blood and death, with human skulls instead of stars.

The American Anti-Imperialist League was established in the United States on June 15, 1898 to battle the American annexation of the Philippines, officially called insular areas. The Anti-Imperialist League opposed annexation on economic, legal, and moral grounds. The original organization was founded in New England and was absorbed by a new national Anti-Imperialist League. Prominent statesman George S. Boutwell served as president from the League’s inception in 1898 to his death in 1905. Lawyer and civil rights activist Moorfield Storey was president from 1905 until the League dissolved in 1921.

Many of the League’s leaders were classical liberals and “Bourbon Democrats” (Grover Cleveland Democrats) who believed in free trade, a gold standard, and limited government; they opposed William Jennings Bryan’s candidacy in the 1896 presidential election. Instead of voting for protectionist Republican William McKinley, however, many, including Edward Atkinson, Moorfield Storey, and Grover Cleveland, cast their ballots for the National Democratic Party presidential ticket of John M. Palmer and Simon Bolivar Buckner. The 1900 presidential election caused internal squabbles in the League. Particularly controversial was the League’s endorsement of William Jennings Bryan, a renowned anti-imperialist but also the leading critic of the gold standard. A few League members, including Storey and Villard, organized a third party to both uphold the gold standard and oppose imperialism. This effort led to the formation of the National Party, which nominated Senator Donelson Caffery of Louisiana. The party quickly collapsed, however, when Caffery dropped out, leaving Bryan as the only anti-imperialist candidate.

A leader and founding member of the League was Mark Twain, who defended its views in the following manner:

“I have read carefully the treaty of Paris, and I have seen that we do not intend to free, but to subjugate the people of the Philippines. We have gone there to conquer, not to redeem. It should, it seems to me, be our pleasure and duty to make those people free, and let them deal with their own domestic questions in their own way. And so I am an anti-imperialist. I am opposed to having the eagle put its talons on any other land.”

[Mark Twain, New York Herald, Oct. 15, 1900]

Mark Twain was vice president of the league from 1901 until his death in 1910.

An editorial in the Springfield Republican, the leading anti-imperialist daily newspaper in the United States at the turn of the 20th century, declared, “Mark Twain has suddenly become the most influential anti-imperialist and the most dreaded critic of the sacrosanct person in the White House that the country contains.” By the second decade of the twentieth century, the League was only a shadow of its former strength. Despite its anti-war record, it did not object to U.S. entry into World War I (though several individual members did oppose intervention). The Anti-Imperialist League disbanded in 1921.

So when are you supposedly “antiwar” conservatives going to start carrying the black and red skull flag in the street?

The risk of being called “anti-patriotic traitors” by Neo-Cons, Multi-national Corporate Fascists, and Zionist Born Agains who combine domestic jingo with foreign policy teacher just too much discomfort for you?

Twain, in particular, whose financial recovery was still shaky, was risking a lot more than one might conclude.

Indeed there are still critics on the Right who savage him for the anti-Imperialism of his last years, and call him senile.

So what is left of American “civilization” continues on the course of not only economic but cultural suicide.

I don’t know the fate of Twain in the Russian Federation. Under the old Soviets he was more intimately and widely known and admired than in the United States.

It was exactly that fine, upstanding Republican Henry Cabot Lodge and an element in the CIA, with a Frenchman as the go-between, who stabbed Diem, a Vietnamese Nationalist, in the back.

With the release of the contemporary records and cables there is no doubt about this–the US played the key role in assassinating Diem.

Kennedy was dead in a month as well.

That is a simple statement of fact, and no conspiracy theory, however one wishes to connect the events.

But that is not the irony.

The irony is that the real admirer of the US Constitution was neither the CIA nor Kennedy nor Kennedy’s disastrous Ambassador to Vietnam, Henry Cabot Lodge, but Ho Chi Minh, whom clear-eyed Eisenhower, as a factual statement without ideological coloring, rightly characterized as the “George Washington of Vietnam”.

Unfortunately Eisenhower was saddled with Nixon and had Dulles as a blind spot.

Without the latter and United Fruit, Castro would never have become “Communist” as the only exit for an independent Cuba.

Indeed, it was exactly Castro hismelf who was still idealistic about the US when he came to the United States after the fall of Battista.

Some of the knee-jerk Cubanos in Florida have been in the US long enough to do some serious research into the American side of the story.

It’s been very intersesting following the Tim R. Vs. everyone debate. What I find most interesting is that I have yet to read any comments denoucing the attrocities of the radical Islam groups. Of course it’s never correct to steriotype anyone. However you should at least be willing to admit that the radicals are not exactly peacfull people. They bomb weddings and funerals and everything in between. You can’t get married or even die in peace. How is that loving and non violent? Cutting off heads or drilling holes in sculls shouldn’t be considered a good thing regardless of the reason. I’m not saying that we are any better when we use cluster bombs and terror for it’s own sake (Shock and Awe by any definition was terrorism). However, in a true debate it seems a little useless to only point out the possitive and refuse to see the negative. In this case I am refering to both sides of the Tim R. Vs. everyone debate. I understand everyones frustration with Tim R. however, being as one sided as him doesn’t score any point with me. Both sides can be and often are wrong when it comes to war. I truly believe that this is the case in our current wars. It’s not that the occupied people don’t have the right to resist. It’s how they do it that is wrong.

There is much more to it that has not occurred to you simply because no one has pointed it out.

Nor will I in great detail. But it hinges on “civilians” and also your ambiguous definition of “radicals”.

Have you ever paid close attention to how the Kurds and the Turks fight one another when they are in the field?

Very instructive.

With the British, the Americans are now, and have been for a long time–since the war in the Philippines–deliberate targeters of civilians and civilian infrastructure.

This includes World War II, though in that war the American ground forces at least, fought in a more civilized manner in both Europe and the Pacific, in regard to civilians an dnuetral at least.

The wikipedia article on the War in the Philippines is an American whitewash.

American atrocities were much worse and more systematic than is given out there. Can you compass Christian ministers displaying mummified Filipino genitals in Churhch services in the US, with appropriate applause? That;s just one incident of many.

Note also that a huge number of American commanders in the Philippine War and many troops were veterans of the Indian Wars.

If you have not already read it, get James’ Bradley’s The Flyboys: A True Story of Courage.

In the first few chapters he gives a brief but carefully researched account of the Japanese and Americans before World War II, and especially about the Americans in the Philippines.

To some extent, the Japanese Imperial Army was imitating the Americans, or what they thought was American training, in China, with their own overlay of Samurai conduct in Korea.

The book is only incidentally about the elder Bush, who makes an appearance as a flyer.

At one time the colonel was a member of the territorial council of Illinois, ends at the formation of the state government, was pressed to become candidate for governor, but begged to be excused. And, though he declined to give his reasons for declining, yet by those who best knew him the cause was not wholly unsurmised. In his official capacity he might be called upon to enter into friendly treaties with Indian tribes, a thing not to be thought of. And even did no such contingency arise, yet he felt there would be an impropriety in the Governor of Illinois stealing out now and then, during a recess of the legislative bodies, for a few days’ shooting at human beings, within the limits of his paternal chief-magistracy. If the governorship offered large honors, from Moredock it demanded larger sacrifices. These were incompatibles. In short, he was not unaware that to be a consistent Indian-hater involves the renunciation of ambition, with its objects — the pomps and glories of the world; and since religion, pronouncing such things vanities, accounts it merit to renounce them, therefore, so far as this goes, Indian-hating, whatever may be thought of it in other respects, may be regarded as not wholly without the efficacy of a devout sentiment.’

“Glad to hear it. Charity, like poetry, should be cultivated, if only for its being graceful. And now, since you have renounced your notion, I should be happy would you, so to speak, renounce your story, too. That story strikes me with even more incredulity than wonder. To me some parts don’t hang together. If the man of hate, how could John Moredock be also the man of love? Either his lone campaigns are fabulous as Hercules’; or else, those being true, what was thrown in about his geniality is but garnish. In short, if ever there was such a man as Moredock, he, in my way of thinking, was either misanthrope or nothing; and his misanthropy the more intense from being focused on one race of men….”

Maybe the subject was “War With Iran Might Be Closer Than You Think”.One should remember how the many Americans believed that the war against Iraq was extemly urgent.They believed that Iraq harbored those “radical Islam groups “,and Iraq was behind 9/11.by using code words such radical Islam!,Islamo-facists,etc over and over people come to accepet any actions done in the name of fighting the muslim menace.

“…that the Muslims are all peaceful and loving and that their civilization with their barbaric, sexist, and homophobic ways, is not inferior to ours.

Thatâ€™s fine. Let the Muslims get nuclear weapons. They are all loving and peaceful people. Just read the Quran and the Hadith and you will see how loving they are and I am sure they would never use nuclear weapons to kill…”

Iraq did not have any of these groups until it was invaded and destryed.But really who are these so many groups!!?

Negroponte was born in London to Greek parents Dimitri John and Catherine Coumantaros Negroponte. His father was a Greek shipping magnate. Negroponte attended the Buckley School in New York City before prepping at Phillips Exeter Academy in New Hampshire. He graduated from Phillips Exeter Academy in 1956, and Yale University in 1960. He was a member of the Psi Upsilon fraternity, alongside William H.T. Bush, the uncle of President George W. Bush, and Porter Goss, who served as Director of Central Intelligence and Director of the Central Intelligence Agency under Negroponte from 2005 to 2006.

Wafer Shaker al Daghma, 34, a teacher at a local UN Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA) elementary school, was killed last Wednesday as she stood preparing to open the wooden door of her home to the troops. According to UNRWA and relatives who found her body, the military used an explosive device on the door which blew most of her head from her body. They then confined the traumatised children â€“ aged from two to 13 â€“ for five hours while the body lay outside the door of the room where they were held.

Although the soldiers finally left the house â€“ in darkness because of a blackout â€“ at around 9pm, Mrs al Daghma’s 13-year-old daughter Samira was too terrified to go outside for help for another two hours because of the continued presence of Israeli armoured vehicles outside her home.

Tiles above a washbasin opposite the front door of the house were still heavily spattered with dried blood yesterday. There was a pile of splintered wooden planks from the destroyed door on the floor where Mrs al Daghma’s body, which soldiers apparently covered with a rug, had lain as the military incursion continued.

Brad Smith- your tedious inculpation entirely misses the mark, in no small part because Islamist atrocities fall entirely outside the purview of this argument. Tim R.’s twin fallacies of extrapolating from confirming instances and vulgar logocentrism demand reply, for they represent a poisonous and specious racist bilge that might convince casual readers that no rebuttal exists. The condemn-athon you propose merely serves to divert scrutiny, and is a favourite trick of those who lack any sort of real argument and imagine that attacks on the other side’s sincerity constitute some sort of profound indictment of the latter’s case. Feigning disinterest whilst insinuating that proponents of a certain viewpoint are sympathetic to or apologetic for “the enemy” is the height of disingenuousness and embodies the sort of cheap trickery one expects from casuists of the neocon persuasion, not “antiwar” folk.

Oh come on Kenneth, are we back to calling me a racist? There are many people on here who forcefully condemn the violent things in the Old Testament and some of the immoral things in the Talmud. Are they racist too? I don’t think so. I actually agree with them. So just because I think Islam is not nearly as peaceful or tolerant as some say it is, that does not mean I am a racist or hate all Muslims. Can you see the distinction here?

Don’t be so coy, Tim. You’ve made a great many statements to the effect that all or most Muslims are barbarians, primitives, and abetters of terror. If you don’t believe this to be racist or discriminatory, mentally substitute “Jew” or “Black” or what have you for “Muslim” and, mutatis muntandis, see what manner of “enlightened” polemeic emerges from the process. Apart from this, your chief error consists of viewing Islam in a totally ahistorical light. Islam is an entirely fluid concept whose content depends on what the Muslims happen to be thinking at the time- it “isn’t” anything, and to impute whatever depredations in the Islamic world happen to be current to it is reductive, essentialist, racist, and above all, empirically false- the kind of mindless faux-anthropology that would be quite at home in colonial propaganda. Don’t act so surprised when someone calls you out on this- you can’t possibly be as stupid as you appear.

I don’t think you would find anyone on this list who would defend the actions of the radical Islamic groups. I didn’t realise we had to denounce them, but if that’s what you want then consider them denounced :)

My main problem is when people attack Muslims or the Koran for the actions of these groups. As a Muslim, I have very little in common with what these groups believe or stand for. I do not condone killing, I believe veils/headscarves are voluntary, I believe men and women are equal, etc etc. And I believe that most other Muslims hold similar viewpoints/beliefs.

But just like Catholicism should not be demonised by the actions of the IRA, Christianity by the actions of the KKK, Indians by the Naxalites, or Communism by the Khmer Rouge, why should Islam be demonised by these extreme and extremely violent groups?

People may argue that there are violent passages in the Koran and I will not disagree, but those passages are almost always written with a specific context or guideline in mind. The Koran was written in a time when war was fairly common and a legitimate way of settling disputes, not just in the Middle East but pretty much everywhere. But a problem occurs when people (such as radical groups) take those violent passages and believe that they override all other passages speaking of peace and justice. As I said above, they interpret the passages in a way which fits their violent outlook on life.

The Koran insists on absolute and total respect for human life, and sees murder as a cardinal sin. But violent radicals believe that other passages overule the passages concerning this respect, whereas I and the Muslims I know believe the opposite.

You sound like a very decent person and very reasonable. I wish your fellow Muslims felt the same way as you! But sadly, I believe that the number of radicals (or those who sympathize with them) is quite large. I hope you and your fellow moderate Muslims will speak up and be more vocal.

Radicals are those who believe that the Quran is the exact word of God and are willing to strictly follow it. They are willing for subjugate women and not allow them the right to vote or any basic human rights. They are willing and happy to stone people to death for “fornication” or for the high crime of being gay. They believe terrorism is justified and that those suicide bombers who kill women and children are “martyrs’ and go straight to paradise where 72 virgins await them.

You asked how many are radical? That is very hard to say. According to the Pew Research Center it really varies depending on the country, but based on the studies, it is a very substantial number, perhaps 30 to 40 percent in some countries.

What to do abou it? Hold the governments directly responsible. Syria, Iran, Saudi Arabia etc. Have the CIA jam their television and radio signals and pump in western media with western ideals so these people can start to be de-programmed. Isolate the countries with a strict policy of containment similar to what Harry S. Truman advocated with Communism. And,if all else fails, as a last resort, if the governments continue to foment Islamic radicalism, hold the leaders (not the people) directly responsible. A couple dozen Tomahawk Cruise missiles landing in their palaces would get their attention I think.

Tim, all Muslims should believe that the Quran is the exact word of God. Your next three sentences (re: stoning, gay, virgins) may be true regarding “radicals” (as we are broadly agreeing on the use of the term here) but not for Islam in general. You will not find those topics covered in the Quran (universal suffrage in the 7th century?). However, these “rules” or guides are covered in various Hadith. Hadith are not the word of God, merely stories about Muhammed or his followers and traditions which have been passed down over the centuries, and are seen as clarifications or guides with which to live your life by (but in my opinion, and I may differ from many Muslims here, they are not compulsory). Also, some of them are more reliable than others (e.g. ones which have several sources).

Some Hadith are labelled Gharib or Weak. These ones may have dubious or weak sources (such as the 72 Virgins Hadith) or may contradict other, more reliable, Hadith. However, some of these Gharib Hadith are used as hard and fast rules by certain Islamic leaders and/or groups and enforced upon people who may not agree with them or (through a lack of education) may not realise they are Gharib or even Hadith (as opposed to from the Quran).

B-Day 03:15(local time) : 5 RGM-109 Tomahawk missiles strike a Pasdaran training base outside Tehran, Iran, it was believed to be the site of a major meeting involving high ranking officers and officials in the region. 5 missiles were lost due to unknown factors. Damage to the base is significant.
B-Day 04:45 : In the morning light radio channels are active and sporadic Mortar fire is reported in the area of Basra and the Baghdad Airport.
B-Day 04:50 : The “Abraham Lincoln” and the “Harry Truman” Aircraft Carriers sail out of port in Bahrain to take up positions for SEAD(Suppression of Air Defenses) operations against possible “hostile” targets along the Persian Gulf coast. They are supported by 10 other warships, an Arleigh Burke Class Destroyer in the fleet launched the missile strike on Iran a few hours earlier.
B-Day 05:00 : A Coalition base near the Iraqi city of Al Kut reports coming under Mortar fire from an unknown opponent.
B-Day 05:25 : A British convoy near Basra comes under fire from a “friendly” Iraqi Police and Army post.
B-Day 05:40 : A US base east of Al Kut near the Iranian border reports concentrated artillery attacks and multiple casualties.
B-Day 05:45 : Coalition PT boats near Basra radio that they have come under attack.
B-Day 05:58 : 3 US Patrols near the Iranian border are attacked, calls for assistance from Iraqi Army are un-answered.
B-Day 06:10 : US Central Command in Qatar orders B-1B bombers to scramble from Qatar and attack Iranian Coastal defenses as activity and potential Missile launches are detected near the city of Shiraz.
B-Day 06:25 : As Bombers ready to take off, Patriot SAM battery radars report multiple targets inbound on the Centcom base. 2 are destroyed, but 3 missiles separate in the air and cover the base in explosions from cluster warheads. The runway is damaged and 1 bomber is hit calling off the mission.
B-Day 06:35 : Mortar strikes in the Baghdad Airport intensify as Radars are tracking unknown targets heading towards Baghdad.
B-Day 06:46 : A massive explosion rips through the “Green” Zone as the area shakes and fires erupt in the area. Air Raid sirens are activated throughout Baghdad. Two massive explosions are heard coming from the Baghdad Airport followed by secondary explosions.
B-Day 07:05 : B-2 bomber crews in Guam and B-52H bomber crews in Diego Garcia are ordered to suit up and be ready for combat missions within an hour.
B-Day 07:12 : Radio channels near Diego Garcia are filled with messages warning ships to stay clear of the island.
B-Day 08:20 : Coalition Rescue crews are searching the rubble in the “Green” Zone when another missile strikes another building collapsing it. The road to the Airport has been cut off by barricades manned by what appear to be Iraqi Army troops. Attempts to approach the area are met by machinegun fire. US Air bases in Iraq are out of action with multiple missile strikes within the last hour.
B-Day 09:00 : 10 Coalition Convoys in Southern Iraq come under attack. An Iraqi Army truck inside a US base outside Baghdad explodes next to a Barracks and leaves a 40 foot crater. Everything within a 200 foot radius is destroyed or damaged.
B-Day 09:10 : Multiple US Marine and Army patrols are attacked by supporting Iraqi forces, gun battles erupt throughout Baghdad as smoke rises from the Airport and “Green” Zone.

According to a British journalist, WT Stead, the concentration camps were nothing more than a cruel torture machine. He writes: “Every one of these children who died as a result of the halving of their rations, thereby exerting pressure onto their family still on the battle-field, was purposefully murdered. The system of half rations stands exposed and stark and unshamefully as a cold-blooded deed of state policy employed with the purpose of ensuring the surrender of people whom we were not able to defeat on the battlefield.”

When he was posted to India and began to read avidly, to make up for lost time, Churchill was profoundly impressed by Darwinism. He lost whatever religious faith he may have had through reading Gibbon, he said and took a particular dislike, for some reason, to the Catholic Church, as well as Christian missions. He became, in his own words, “a materialist to the tips of my fingers,” and he fervently upheld the worldview that human life is a struggle for existence, with the outcome the survival of the fittest. This philosophy of life and history Churchill expressed in his one novel, Savrola. That Churchill was a racist goes without saying, yet his racism went deeper than with most of his contemporaries. It is curious how, with his stark Darwinian outlook, his elevation of war to the central place in human history, and his racism, as well as his fixation on “great leaders,” Churchill’s worldview resembled that of his antagonist, Hitler.

When Churchill was not actually engaged in war, he was reporting on it. He early made a reputation for himself as a war correspondent, in Kitchener’s campaign in the Sudan and in the Boer War. In December, 1900, a dinner was given at the Waldorf-Astoria in honor of the young journalist, recently returned from his well-publicized adventures in South Africa. Mark Twain, who introduced him, had already, it seems, caught on to Churchill. In a brief satirical speech, Twain slyly suggested that, with his English father and American mother, Churchill was the perfect representative of Anglo-American cant….”

As a devout advocate of laissez-faire, Trevelyan also claimed that aiding the Irish brought “the risk of paralyzing all private enterprise.” Thus he ruled out providing any more government food, despite early reports the potato blight had already been spotted amid the next harvest in the west of Ireland. Trevelyan believed Peel’s policy of providing cheap Indian corn meal to the Irish had been a mistake because it undercut market prices and had discouraged private food dealers from importing the needed food. This year, the British government would do nothing. The food depots would be closed on schedule and the Irish fed via the free market, reducing their dependence on the government while at the same time maintaining the rights of private enterprise….

From the earliest endeavours of the British East India Company on the Subcontinent but especially since 1857â€”the year of the first major Indian rebellion against British ruleâ€”the British Raj, as the British governing body was known after 1857, had instituted a widespread series of mercantilist economic rules intended to foster a favourable balance of trade for Britain relative to the Subcontinent as well as other colonies, which had a dramatic impact on the economic milieu within India. Because of these effects and the Raj’s role as the supreme governing body within India, contemporary scholars such as Romesh Dutt in 1900â€”who had himself witnessed the famines first-handâ€”and present-day scholars such as Amartya Sen agree, that the famines were a product both of uneven rainfall and British economic and administrative policies.

These policies had, since 1857, led to the seizure and conversion of local farmland to foreign-owned plantations, restrictions on internal trade, heavy taxation of Indians to support unsuccessful British expeditions in Afghanistan like the Second Anglo-Afghan War, inflationary measures that increased the price of food, and substantial exports of staple crops from India to Britain… In the century preceding, the first Bengal famine of 1770 is estimated to have taken nearly one-third of the population. In 1865-66, severe drought struck Orissa and was met by British official inaction. Secretary of State for India Lord Salisbury later regretted,

“I did nothing for two months. Before that time the monsoon had closed the ports of Orissaâ€”help was impossibleâ€”andâ€”it is saidâ€”a million people died. The Governments of India and Bengal had taken in effect no precautions whatever.â€¦ I never could feel that I was free from all blame for the result…” â€

Some British citizens such as William Digby agitated for policy reforms and famine relief, but Lord Lytton, the governing British viceroy in India, opposed such changes in the belief that they would stimulate shirking by Indian workers. Reacting against calls for relief during the 1877-79 famine, Lytton replied, “Let the British public foot the bill for its ‘cheap sentiment,’ if it wished to save life at a cost that would bankrupt India,” substantively ordering “there is to be no interference of any kind on the part of Government with the object of reducing the price of food,” and instructing district officers to “discourage relief works in every possible way…. Mere distress is not a sufficient reason for opening a relief work.” The Famine Commission of 1880 observed that each province in British India, including Burma, had a surplus of foodgrains, and the annual surplus amounted to 5.16 million tons (Bhatia, 1970). At that time, annual export of rice and other grains from India was approximately one million tons….

wikipedia s.v. Famine in India

What was that old line of Marie Antoinette–oh yeah–“Let them eat the Invisible Hand!”.